Schutter Paces NU During Husker Invite's Final Day

LINCOLN?Junior Ben Schutter led a Nebraska effort featuring three event titles and three new NCAA qualifying performances Saturday during the final session of the 32nd annual Frank Sevigne Husker Invitational at the Devaney Center Indoor Track. 2,787 spectators packed the facility during Nebraska’s Dollar Days promotion, pushing the two-day attendance total to more than 4,300.

 

Schutter completed an outstanding effort Saturday in the men’s heptathlon by winning his second consecutive Husker Invite championship while also setting a new meet record with his personal-best score of 5,474. In the process, he earned an NCAA provisional qualification with the nation’s eighth-best score this season. Schutter’s total bested the previous meet record of 5,422 set by Knut Sommerfeldt (unattached) in 2005.

 

A Larned, Kan., native, Schutter recorded a pair of individual event bests during the two-day competition, including an impressive clocking of 8.33 in the 60-meter hurdles to begin the final day. He also cleared 14-9 in the pole vault, just shy of his personal record, while finishing the day with a time of 2:50.05 in the 1,000-meter run. On Friday, Schutter decimated his previous event best in the shot put by two and one-half feet with a mark of 48-8 1/4.

 

Sophomore teammate Pat Burke, who was competing unattached, also put together a phenomenal weekend culminating in a career-best total of 5,292. Burke’s performance included notable clearances of 6-10 ? in the high jump and 15-5 in the pole vault.

 

On the track, senior Nate Probasco won his second career Husker Invite title in the men’s 200-meter dash with a season-best mark of 21.12. A two-time Big 12 champion in the event, he pulled away from UTEP’s Daniel Ward, the defending meet champ, down the homestretch while earning his first NCAA provisional time of the year. The clocking marked Probasco’s fastest indoors in the event since earning All-America honors in 2005 with his personal best of 20.93, and he tied the nation’s fifth-fastest performance of the season entering the weekend.

 

Freshman teammate Scott Wims, who earlier placed third in the men’s 60-meter dash final, also earned bronze in the 200 (21.30). Fellow freshman Dax Danns was the runner-up finisher in the men’s 60 dash with a career-best performance of 6.79, which is the top performance for the NU men’s team thus far in 2007.

 

Continuing a breakthrough season in the women’s triple jump was sophomore Zarinah Suluki-Drakes, who placed third after extending her personal best by more than nine inches to an NCAA provisional-qualifying 41-10 ?. Suluki-Drakes moved into fourth place in the Big 12 standings with the effort. Freshman Leandra McGruder also raised her career-best mark to 40-11, good for seventh in the league, by placing fourth.

 

Sophomore Brysun Stately continued to show progress in the women’s pole vault by reaching a season-best height of 13-1 ?. The 2006 NCAA All-American’s runner-up mark ranked eighth-best among all NCAA performers entering the weekend.

 

Senior Kim Pancoast added Nebraska’s final individual victory of the weekend with a winning time of 2:51.44 in the women’s 3,000 meters. Pancoast easily bested her previous season best of 2:56.73, while she also took over the top spot on the Big 12 season performance list.

 

Saturday was a special day for the Pancoast family on the track, as Kim’s younger sister, sophomore Jennifer Pancoast, earned runner-up honors in the women’s 3,000-meter run. Jennifer Pancoast dropped nearly 20 seconds off her previous best of 10:13.04 and took over the Big 12’s sixth-place ranking this season in the process.

 

Freshman Nikita Eades extended her streak of meets with a personal best in the women’s 60-meter hurdles to four straight to open her career while earning third place on Saturday. Eades lowered her time to 8.46 while finishing behind Tennessee’s Pavi’elle James and IowaState’s Rebecca Williams. The mark was only 0.03 shy of the NCAA provisional standard.

 

Two meet records were set Saturday. In addition to the heptathlon performance by Schutter, Iowa’s Kineke Alexander added a new standard by posting the nation’s fastest time in the women’s 400-meter dash this season with a DevaneyCenter record of 52.01.

 

Alexander was named the meet’s Outstanding Women’s Athlete after breaking the former 400-meter dash record that had stood for 18 years, while Kansas’ Egor Agafonov, who set the meet standard in the men’s weight throw on Friday, garnered the men’s honor.

                                                                                                              

Nebraska takes to the road for the first time this season next weekend, as the Huskers split up and send athletes to Fayetteville, Ark., for the Tyson Invitational and to Ames, Iowa, for the Iowa State Classic.